Also

* Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi’s planned release of his recommendation for lowering workers’ compensation insurance rates, originally set for Thursday, was rescheduled for today. The commissioner has indicated that he will issue a nonbinding recommendation that insurers cut their rates by 18% to 20% for policies written or renewed between July 1 and Dec. 31.

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* Trying to prevent jobs from going to foreign countries, the Assembly approved a bill that would ban state contractors from offshoring work. The measure is pending in the Senate.

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* Aventis of France and Chiron Corp. of Emeryville, Calif., the biggest makers of influenza shots, won an order from the U.S. government to make a vaccine to protect against bird flu. They will make 8,000 to 10,000 doses of an experimental vaccine based on a strain of the virus that has killed 23 people in Asia.